NHS Services (Access)

Baroness Blackwood of North Oxford Excerpts

Wednesday 15th October 2014 Commons Chamber

[Andy Burnham]

That is inaccurate, because it was not a private-only shortlist—there was an NHS bidder in the frame at the time. The hon. Gentleman needs to keep his facts straight. As I said earlier, I introduced the NHS preferred provider principle, and that is my policy. [Interruption.] If he wants to dispute that, then the facts will speak for themselves. The shortlist had public and private on it.

[Nicola Blackwood (Oxford West and Abingdon) (Con)]

rose—

[Andy Burnham]

I will give way one last time and then finish.

[Nicola Blackwood]

The shadow Secretary of State is being very generous, and I hope that he will respond to me in a non-partisan way. I speak as the daughter of two NHS workers and as somebody who has recently had a very close family member survive an emergency operation for a life-threatening illness. Will he clarify Labour’s position on what it would do in government about a reorganisation, because the difference between a restructuring and a reorganisation is not clear to me? The British Medical Association and GP leaders have been very concerned about exactly what the policy is and what it would mean, so will he make that clear? He has been criticising certain policies, and I would like to understand what his policy would be.

[Andy Burnham]

I am glad that the hon. Lady asked that—it is a very fair question. I imagine that a reorganisation is the last thing that people in the NHS would want right now. My definition of a structural reorganisation is where we stand down a whole set of organisations and then create a whole set of new ones. I have been very clear that I will not do what the right hon. Member for South Cambridgeshire (Mr Lansley) did. I will work with the organisations that I inherit. I will work with CCGs, and with health and wellbeing boards, in particular. Health and wellbeing boards were one of the few good things that came out of the Act, because they are a partnership between local government and the NHS, and that is something I can work with. She asked a fair question and I hope I have given her a fair answer. A structural reorganisation where we make everybody redundant again and recreate organisations will not help anybody. In fact, if the Government wanted GP-led commissioning, they should simply have put doctors in charge of the old primary care trusts. If they had done that, they would have saved a lot of money and a lot of heartache in the process.

I am going to finish on NHS funding. The letter I mentioned at the beginning called for a long-term spending plan for the NHS. The NHS Confederation has put that at £2 billion a year. At the Conservative party conference, the Prime Minister committed to maintaining the ring fence for health in the next Parliament, but experts are clear that that will not be enough to prevent the NHS from tipping into a full-blown crisis. Indeed, the Chair of the Health Committee, the hon. Member for Totnes (Dr Wollaston), has said:

“Maintaining the ring-fence on health spending is not enough.”

I am sure the hon. Lady is right, but her problem—and the problem for everyone on the Conservative Benches—is that they have chosen a different spending priority. They have given a commitment to tax cuts for higher earners, which will cost an unfunded £7 billion. What that means in reality is that if the Tories get back in, any spare money will go towards filling that black hole and there will be nothing left for the NHS, so the outlook for the NHS under the Tories in the next Parliament is very bleak indeed. Given current policy direction on competition and the funding plans they have announced, the NHS is looking at a toxic combination of cuts and privatisation under a re-elected Tory Government.

By contrast, Labour’s priority is not tax cuts for some, but a strong NHS for all. We have found an extra £2.5 billion a year—that is not spin; it is money we have committed to—to build the NHS of the future, and the question before the House tonight is whether it should call on the Government to match it.

Labour’s plan is for a national health and care service—full integration of health and social care, starting in the home and building one team around the person. We will do that by recruiting 20,000 more nurses, 3,000 more midwives, 8,000 more GPs and 5,000 extra home care workers by the end of the next Parliament—a new generation work force in the NHS, working from home to hospital, transforming the delivery of care. Social care is prevention, and by uniting it with the NHS we can turn the financial tide around and place the system on a path towards financial sustainability.

Labour has a credible plan for the NHS and the money to back it up. This House needs to decide tonight whether it agrees and whether it is prepared to match the money needed to turn the NHS around. The decision we make tonight will clarify the decision before the country next May. Will our top priority be, as the PM used to say, those three letters: NHS? Or will it be tax cuts for some, but an NHS crisis for all? That is the choice. We have made ours and our choice is the NHS.